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Closing The Circle With THOMAS VIKSTROM From THERION · HEAVY Music Interviews

• 0:24
  Hi, everybody. Welcome to my studio. This is Thomas Bigstrom from the
• 0:28
  band Theoryan and we're here to talk about us today. Yeah, thanks for
• 0:35
  joining us to runna. Yeah, it's fine, it's fine. I was
• 0:39
  out last night, so I have a little bit of a hangover, but
• 0:41
  I cast it myself, so no complaints. It's still looking good, mane
• 0:45
  you hold yourself together pretty well. Thank you for being fifty five. It's
• 0:49
  okay. Sagi Saberan releasing new album in the closing chapter of a trilogy with
• 0:57
  leviat and three on December fifteenth. Like I still more than a month away,
• 1:02
  say, like, what's this very like for you? Mate? Like
• 1:03
  the album's done, let's put the bed now. You just got to wait
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  for it to come out, like you's sort of that waiting is boring,
• 1:10
  but it is what it is, you know, And you know, I'm
• 1:14
  very pleased with the results, so I I it's gonna be fun to hear
• 1:17
  what people think about it, you know. And we're also preparing for going
• 1:23
  to Mexico in January. We will follow this up with the tour, of
• 1:26
  course, So we start off in January in Mexico City with a full symphony
• 1:30
  orchestra at this time, and then we're planning to go through Europe and maybe
• 1:37
  China. You know. Wow, it's gonna be a lot of fun.
• 1:42
  Yeah, that's it. That's pretty pretty funny because to people this will be
• 1:47
  a new record. For me, I already digested it, you know.
• 1:49
  For me, it's not a new record anymore. Number three, you know,
• 1:53
  because I heard it so many times. Are you ready to move on
• 1:56
  to the next one? Yeah, it's somewhere back here. We didn't plan
• 2:00
  that yet though, but there will be a next one definitely, but not
• 2:04
  to leviat On four though. It's going to be something new. So I
• 2:08
  did this. Oh my lord, it's beIN an epic journey for you.
• 2:12
  I have the three albums starting with lebi At and in twenty twenty one,
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  two and twenty two, and the third this year was the experience of bringing
• 2:20
  their trilogy to life. Everything that you have mentioned it in me. That
• 2:23
  was not the plan from the beginning. You know, we started to write
• 2:28
  for a new album, me and Christopher, and exactly when we started,
• 2:31
  almost on the day, the COVID came and total lockdown, you know,
• 2:38
  right, so I couldn't go there, and he couldn't come here, you
• 2:42
  know, so let's send files for while I'm back, you know, like
• 2:46
  that and write like that, which works good today. Actually it's a pity
• 2:51
  we can't meet, but it works. And since it was a lockdown here
• 2:55
  in Spain, it was hysterical lockdown. You know. You could go to
• 2:59
  the supermarket once a day alone. That was it. And so there was
• 3:06
  nothing more to do, not much more to do than writing songs. You
• 3:08
  don't work and order food for Burger king. And so we started to write,
• 3:16
  you know, and I was asking Christopher what kind of direction do you
• 3:21
  want to go on this album, you know, and his answer was it's
• 3:25
  gonna be good. Okay, right, that's a bit vague, but okay.
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  So which resulted in in the end we had so many songs, you
• 3:38
  know, in different styles, everything from from the hardest to the almost in
• 3:45
  the borderlines to pop, you know, because we just wrote. And so
• 3:53
  Christopher said that, yeah, we have so many songs, and so let's
• 3:55
  not make one album. Let's make three and put them out in a short
• 4:00
  period of time. That's how the story was, right, so that the
• 4:03
  whole lot was pretty much written at the start, and then you just separate
• 4:06
  it and release it after that. Yeah, we checked out and put the
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  most commercial in theory on commercial in sense of Perian on the first album,
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  and the second one is like more a little bit darker, so to speak,
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  and this third one we we simply go bananas. You know. It's
• 4:29
  more progressive, it's more experimental influences from different kinds of things, you know.
• 4:36
  So yeah, and for me, I mean that's something artists always say,
• 4:42
  Oh, the latest album is the best way I've ever done. But
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  out of this three, I hold number three as a favorite, honestly.
• 4:51
  So then like, come by what you just said that? Like, hell,
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  does football it and three actually concleared the journey? Is it just my
• 4:58
  name only? Or is this sort of something actually thrown it together? That's
• 5:02
  actually it's actually Cristy's idea to call it le Viatin And I actually didn't ask
• 5:08
  him why, But I don't think I mean this, this triology could definitely
• 5:14
  be named the COVID Sessions, you know, but it's cooler with the viathm
• 5:23
  you sort of you touched on this a little bit with the experimentation of my
• 5:26
  but tell us about Levitt and three from a musical point, of view and
• 5:29
  what you've garned forward they compare to the other ones. Yeah, like like
• 5:33
  to write with theory, and is very funny because there are actually no rules,
• 5:39
  there's no boundaries for what you're allowed to do. And I think that
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  on the third one, that's that's shown, you know, and we're For
• 5:49
  example, there is a song called Duende on the album and I was in
• 5:56
  here trying to put something together and my girlfriend had a had a TV on
• 6:00
  very loud, so I was like, can you please take that down a
• 6:05
  little bit? You know. I was about to say that, but then
• 6:08
  I heard answer the documentary about Flamenco, you know, Spanish, and I
• 6:15
  was like, I wonder if it's possible to infuse that into a hard rock
• 6:21
  metal song. So I tried and that became this song that's called Duende on
• 6:28
  the album. It's Flamenco inspired and yeah, and I before I sent it
• 6:32
  to Christoprath, ah, he will he will not accept this, you know,
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  but he was like, oh, that's very cool, let's put it
• 6:38
  on the album. So we did. So that's the fun thing in there.
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  And there are no rules for what you what you are allowed so to
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  speak, to do and that gives you a sense of big freedom when you
• 6:50
  write melodies and songs. You know. The one of the massive strengths on
• 6:57
  this album that it is a quitcro dynamics between yourself and Laurie Lewis, Like
• 7:00
  how much work and planning guys into making sure your voice is pumpliment each other.
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  Like it's an easy process. Oh, pure duck. No, I
• 7:14
  know, you know, we know these voices so good. So I mean
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  when we write, when I write a song, for example, I can
• 7:21
  be writing it with a guy singing in my head, you know, or
• 7:26
  or a girl. But then Christopher listen and he has another point of view,
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  and I mean he started this band, so I let him have the
• 7:33
  last words. We don't agree all the time, but you know, and
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  mostly it's because you see it from from different directions, which which I think
• 7:44
  is good. But there is something. I mean, there's a lot of
• 7:47
  harmonies and a lot of vocals going on on the record, so it's a
• 7:51
  lot of a lot of planning. You know, when you when you put
• 7:55
  music in a in a song and you record it, there are not limited
• 8:00
  of space actually, because when you start to record too much, you will
• 8:03
  not hear certain things, you know, But if you listen to a song
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  for example, like the unsung layments on this album or Lament, I don't
• 8:13
  know how you say that lement. It's so much layers of choirs and they
• 8:18
  are they are figured out very very much before we go into the studio and
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  do it. And I also had to because I bring in other people to
• 8:31
  sing so it blends with my voice, you know, and the studio time
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  is limited, so I have to plan it very well and to show them
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  what to sing. And you know, so it's a pretty complex work but
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  very funny. You know. It's a little bit like like like an advanced
• 8:48
  lego. Does it never like and I how to put this right? Like?
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  Does it ever get frustrating? Like you know what you what you want
• 8:58
  to ord to come out and SAYD but so many other lights coming into it
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  as well. Everything's got to sort of perfectly before it works like this again
• 9:05
  frustrating that I'm just ad live. I guess well, you know, when
• 9:16
  you record a song, it's very seldom it comes out exactly like you have
• 9:20
  it in your head, at least in my care case. But no,
• 9:24
  I don't think it's so frustrating really, but there is always points in an
• 9:30
  album that you release that you go, oh fuck, I should have done
• 9:31
  this instead, but now it's too late. So we say in Sweden,
• 9:37
  it's no idea to cry over minutes that are spilt. You know, it
• 9:41
  doesn't get you anyway. And there's like, there's always so much gone on
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  musically with therey in my life. You've got the orchestral pieces, itause,
• 9:56
  there's classical metal that's power met, there's opera. How do you find the
• 9:58
  balance in the writing and creative process to make sure that it doesn't, like
• 10:03
  you said before, like it doesn't dround each other out, or it doesn't
• 10:07
  doesn't overpower everything else, Like how hard does it define that balance? That's
• 10:13
  a good question, but it's it's it's hard. It's hard to answer that.
• 10:16
  Really, we just use our ears and what we feel and hope that
• 10:20
  people will agree with us. Really, but yeah, that's the simple answer.
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  But and also what I said before, there are no rules for what
• 10:31
  we are doing. If we think that this sounds cool, we will put
• 10:35
  it out and hopefully people have the same taste as us. You know,
• 10:41
  you start a touch on this before up made, but in January you plan
• 10:45
  with a full Symphony Orchestra in Mexico. So actually, like they have big
• 10:50
  said, like how big a scale is that going to be? That's going
• 10:54
  to be pretty big scale. It's one of the biggest arenas in Mexico,
• 10:58
  in Mexico City, mm hmm. And we were offered to do this And
• 11:03
  Hi, how are you Thomas? You see my cat behind here? Are
• 11:13
  you sleeping now? He's always with me in the studio? Is it that?
• 11:18
  Is it a tarr or dog? It's pretty big, but it's a
• 11:22
  big cat, a big fat cat. Yeah. Cool? Correct? Correct,
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  Yeah, We're going to do that in in one of the biggest,
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  one of the biggest holes they have for music and sports events in in Mexico
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  City. So it's going to be really cool, you know, and the
• 11:46
  tickets are selling good. We thought first it was too big to have it
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  there, you know, but it seems like it's okay, you know,
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  always cool to play with the real orchestra and a really conductor, you know,
• 11:58
  the real thing. Yeah, so I can't wait. So we're going
• 12:03
  there like a little over a week to rehearsal first with them, you know,
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  and so we make sure that everything sticks together, you have to.
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  Yeah, that's a music issue, right, Like, how different is it
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  for you to play with something like a full orchestra? And I like you
• 12:18
  said you get swiped up in the moment, were you like just so grand
• 12:24
  it is? I mean there is when you play with a symphony orchestra,
• 12:28
  there are no I mean, when we play with only the band, if
• 12:31
  something goes wrong, we can always catch up, you know, we can
• 12:35
  always improvise. But with an orchestra, if you're not there, the train
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  leaves and you are still in the platform, you know. Yeah, I
• 12:48
  mean I've done a lot of musicals and also opera, you know, and
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  there's and when you do that, it's mostly only in an orchestra, no,
• 12:56
  not the band, you know, And then you have to watch this
• 13:00
  guy, you know and understand what he means. You know, how do
• 13:03
  you got with that? Because yeah, I'm used to it now, but
• 13:09
  sometimes in the beginning it's pretty complex, you know. And I mean these
• 13:11
  guys, they they are playing what's what's written? You know, they don't
• 13:18
  care, you know, they just play on. But it's fantastic some of
• 13:26
  some of these guys, you know who sits in an orchestra, they can
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  read a paper and say, oh, what a good song this is.
• 13:33
  It's amazing, it's amazing. Look at the guy, like, what's that
• 13:37
  North and crosses exactly exactly. But you're only just doing the one shot with
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  the orchestra, and the rest of the Rolls is going to be the band?
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  Is that right? Yeah? Yeah, it would be. It would
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  be honestly too expensive, extremely expensive to take a full orchestra around doesn't work.
• 14:00
  And if you're going to use a local orchestra in every place, you
• 14:03
  never know what to get. Sometimes it might be too bad, you know,
• 14:07
  or too different, you know, especially someone that was so many moving
• 14:11
  parts, so like you've got to have you got to have some totally with
• 14:15
  practice and every single instrument is miked up, you know. And so yeah,
• 14:22
  so I'm fortunate that that doesn't work. Okay, Well that's about all
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  I've got for it in I Thoma's been an absolute pleasure. We made the
• 14:31
  album of Why It in three is out on December fifteenth. And what is
• 14:35
  going to be doing next? You haven't decided whether you're gonna do another epic
• 14:39
  story next or it's just gonna be one off albums. I don't know,
• 14:43
  actually, I we haven't discussed that, but if I know Christopher correct,
• 14:50
  there's probably gonna be something very special, but I don't know. Let's get
• 14:54
  through this one first. Absolutely, I hope you like it. You know,
• 15:00
  I don't listened to it before. I before we had a chat and
• 15:01
  it's completely different than anything I've listened to before, to be honest, But
• 15:05
  it's just it's it's it's grand like this. It's got atmosphere, it's got
• 15:11
  cinematics, it's got I'd like to listen with a couple more times and let
• 15:16
  it fully digest. But what I heard of it the first time and blame
• 15:20
  me away made it is very well done. Cool. Thank you, Thank
• 15:24
  you talking to you, and thank you for having me. If you do
• 15:28
  make it to Australia and make sure you look us up in Brisbane, brother
• 15:31
  and well we'll have a couple of frothies and if you can work on that
• 15:33
  hangover that would be great. Ye shop rock killing rock Ka into into the
• 16:53
  joy like guys like you see shape tst spelling to strin is yes us school
• 19:23
  do to as the gun into the ties up fasty gas stack. Oh,
• 20:08
  I know as a retort sake, go the bory go So he don't say
• 21:27
  I even saying you a